Friends
by dead era
Summary: It's his favorite thing about being half ghost, and it isn't flying. Late Dannyversary 2015. Oneshot.


**Late Dannyversary fanfic. Felt like writing some nice friendship stuff so I did! Sorry, been very busy lately.**

-spooky

There are so many things Danny hates about being half ghost. He hates the constant fighting, he hates the bruising and he hates the lies. He hates the looks of disappointment and he hates the stares that whisper _freak_ in his ear. He hates the glances of pity most of all, like people are afraid to look at him too long because he might break. He hates having to look so small and pretend to be so meek when he's not, he knows exactly how powerful he is and it scares him, terrifies him and he hates the possibilities of what he could do with such power but not as much as having to pretend it doesn't exist. He can't stand living a lie.

That is why his favorite thing about being half ghost is not flying. It's his friends. They trust him to the ends of the earth and back, farther actually, to the infinite ends of the Ghost Zone. He trusts them just as much. He trusts them with so much. He trusts them to stitch him back together when things fall to pieces, whether they're sewing up a wound or comforting him after something awful happens. They do so much for him and ask nothing in return. They're reliable, they're constant, they're there and they know everything about his life, so he's never living a lie with them. He can be him. He doesn't have to be a mask and he doesn't have to be Atlas.

So much has changed because of Danny's powers. Hanging out doesn't mean just playing video games, it means playing video games while chatting about ghosts and theorizing and strategizing. It means testing new weapons and sabotaging the dangerous ones while pilfering the useful ones. It means training together in the midnight hours. It means figuring out the tiniest nuances of Danny's powers and figuring out an application for them.

Right now it means Danny grabbing a loose segment of a brick wall inside the abandoned warehouse they're practicing in. He hoists it into the air with one hand, grabbing another chunk with the other and attempting to juggle them. They're twice as big as he is and several bricks thick, easily weighing a thousand pounds each. For Danny this is no sweat. The juggling part is though, and in bobbling one chunk the other goes down too, causing them to break apart as they hit the ground. "Danny," Sam admonishes from a distance while the much closer Tucker yelps, stumbles back and yells, "Be careful!" He trips on a stray brick and stumbles around, somehow managing to twist around as he falls and raise his PDA above his head. "My ba- oof!" He shouts, and it isn't hard to guess he meant to say 'my baby'. Danny finds this reaction so funny that he starts busting up with laughter, wrapping his arms around his stomach and bending over so much he starts to fall, or would have had he not started floating. He's rolling in the air and Tucker is struggling to his feet, brandishing his device as he stomps indignantly over to Danny, but as he gets closer Danny can see he's blushing and he's not actually mad. Sam's cracking up too, even if she didn't think Danny's stunt was funny. She jogs over to them as Tucker begins to rant between gasping laughter, and suddenly she begins to defend Danny, shouting, "My client is innocent!" This makes Danny laugh even harder, and he's convulsing with laughter on his back, gasping for air even though he doesn't even really need to breathe.

As Sam and Tucker's faces are red his is green, and the difference doesn't bother any of them. It doesn't matter that Danny is floating, or that his hair is white and his eyes are radioactive green. Sam and Tucker have both told him they think he looks cool with white hair, and his eyes are terrifying when he's mad but they're cool when he's not because his irises swirl like the Ghost Zone. They think the scar running up his arm that looks like lightning is cool, even if it is a horrible, visible reminder of the portal accident. They don't care that he's a walking glowstick, especially because of his freckles. They don't care that he's different. They don't care that at this point, he's one of the single most powerful ghosts out there from sheer strength alone. They don't care, and that's the best thing about being half ghost for him.


End file.
